Day: November 8, 2015

Southeast Asia
Pyu Saw Htee

Guerillas harass paramilitaries in Burma

Faced with a growing insurgency from regional guerilla cells integrated into the armed resistance network known as the People’s Defense Force (PDF), Burma’s junta has been training its own paramilitary corps made up of conservative Buddhists, Burman ethno-nationalists and other regime supporters—named the Pyu Saw Htee, after a legendary king of the ancient Pagan Dynasty. Its strongest base of support is in the Ma Ba Tha (Patriotic Association of Myanmar), which has long been accused of fomenting attacks on Muslims and ethnic minorities. But the Pyu Saw Htee’s efforts to establish local control are being met with effective guerilla harassment. (Photo of Pyu Saw Htee militia from pro-junta media outlets, via Myanmar Now)

The Amazon
Pachamama

‘Dubia Cardinal’ rages against Pachamama

Cardinal Walter Brandmüller, one of the two remaining “dubia cardinals” who dissented from a perceived liberal tilt in the Catholic Church, praised the men who stole the controversial “Pachamama statues” from a church in Rome during last month’s Amazon Synod and threw them into the Tiber River. The German cardinal hailed the perpetrators as “courageous prophets of today.” The statues, representing the Earth Mother deity of many traditional peoples in South America, had been used in events and rituals during the Amazon Synod, which brought together 185 bishops from across the Amazon Basin. The Synod was also attended by indigenous leaders, and issued a final statement stressing the threat of climate change and the need for a concept of “ecological sin.” (Photo: National Catholic Reporter)

Central America

Post-electoral violence in Nicaragua

Followers of the indigenous party Yatama clashed with police and supporters of the ruling FSLN on Nicaragua’s Caribbean coast in the aftermath of contested national elections.

Mexico

El Chapo one step closer to extradition

Mexico's imprisoned top drug lord Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán came another step closer to extradition when a judge turned down five requests for an injunction to halt it.

RUSSIA’S SYRIA INTERVENTION… AND THE LEFT

The ‘War on Terror’ and its New Supporters

by Leila Al Shami

Its now been five weeks since Russia began its bombing campaign in support of the fascist regime in Syria, transforming a struggle against domestic tyranny into resistance against foreign invasion and occupation. The discourse used to justify Russia’s intervention is just an extension of the “War on Terror.” The Americans invaded and occupied Iraq and Afghanistan on the pretext of “fighting terrorism,” thus creating more terrorism and extremism, and now the Russians and Iranians are doing the same in Syria. The difference is that many of those who vocally opposed the first war on terror now remain silent or actively support this latest incarnation.

Of course “terrorism” is a blanket term which the Syrian regime employs against any dissent. And the main targets of Russia’s imperialist adventures have not been the Daesh (ISIS) fascists. Instead Russia’s military might is directed at Syria’s resistance militias and civilians living in liberated zones which have become death camps under the state’s scorched earth tactics and crippling blockades. It’s the working class suburbs and rural districts of Hama and Idlib, those that raged so fiercely against the regime, that are today being pounded by Russian airstrikes. The people attacked in Homs are those who defeated Daesh a year ago.

Continue ReadingRUSSIA’S SYRIA INTERVENTION… AND THE LEFT 

LIBERIANS IN U.S. FACE GROWING EBOLA STIGMA

by Philippa Garson, IRIN

NEW YORK — Africans living in the US from the three Ebola-affected countries of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone are under enormous pressure trying to help their families and ravaged communities back home. And they face an additional challenge: stigma.

For the residents of “Little Liberia,” one of Liberia’s biggest emigrant communities in Staten Island, New York, the path to integration has been strewn with hurdles. Many of the several thousand residents came decades ago as refugees from the civil war in Liberia. Eking out a living, attaining resident status, integrating with at times unfriendly neighbors and, in recent months, helping those families hard hit by Ebola at home, has been an uphill battle.

But when Thomas Eric Duncan, a Liberian, was diagnosed with Ebola in a Dallas hospital in September, “all hell broke loose here,” Oretha Bestman-Yates, president of the Staten Island Liberian community, told IRIN.

Continue ReadingLIBERIANS IN U.S. FACE GROWING EBOLA STIGMA 
Palestine

Bedouin under attack from Sinai to Hebron

The Egyptian army is destroying hundreds of Bedouin homes along the Gaza border to create a "security zone," while the Israeli army razed more Bedouin homes on the West Bank.